Outsmarting, Selling Apartheid Discussed at First Monday Forum

(Public domain, Wikimedia Commons)

(15 February 2016). Authors of two recent books about South Africa’s apartheid era will discuss their works at the next First Monday Forum on Monday, 7 March 2016 at American Foreign Service Association, or AFSA, headquarters in Washington, D.C.

At the forum, Dan Whitman, former program development officer at the U.S. Embassy in Pretoria, talks about his book, Outsmarting Apartheid: An Oral History of South Africa’s Cultural and Educational Exchange with the United States, 1960-1999. Whitman tells about cultural and educational exchange programs between the U.S. and South Africa that recruited some 3,000 participants, who experienced first-hand the workings of American democracy, with many becoming participants in that country’s multi-racial democratic elections.

New York Times reporter Ron Nixon discusses his new book, Selling Apartheid: South Africa’s Global Propaganda War. The book tells about the South African government’s worldwide campaign that brought together an unusual array supporters: global corporations, conservative religious organizations and an unlikely coalition of liberal U.S. black clergy, and anti-communist black conservatives aligned with right-wing Cold War politicians.

First Monday forums are a joint project of the USC Center on Public Diplomacy, USC Annenberg Center on Communication Leadership and Policy, and Public Diplomacy Council. The event takes place on Monday, 7 March 2016 at 12 noon, at AFSA headquarters, 2101 E Street NW, Washington DC (Foggy Bottom metro). Sandwiches and refreshments will be served.

The event is free, but advance registrations by e-mail are required: FirstMondayForum.RSVP@gmail.com.